Aluminium and fluoride in drinking water in relation to later dementia risk
Abstract
Background
Environmental risk factors for dementia are poorly understood. Aluminium and fluorine in drinking water have been linked with dementia but uncertainties remain about this relationship.
Aims
In the largest longitudinal study in this context, we set out to explore the individual effect of aluminium and fluoride in drinking water on dementia risk and, as fluorine can increase absorption of aluminium, we also examine any synergistic influence on dementia.
Method
We used Cox models to investigate the association between mean aluminium and fluoride levels in drinking water at their residential location (collected 2005–2012 by the Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland) with dementia in members of the Scottish Mental Survey 1932 cohort who were alive in 2005.
Results
A total of 1972 out of 6990 individuals developed dementia by the linkage date in 2012. Dementia risk was raised with increasing mean aluminium levels in women (hazard ratio per s.d. increase 1.09, 95% CI 1.03–1.15, P < 0.001) and men (1.12, 95% CI 1.03–1.21, P = 0.004). A dose-response pattern of association was observed between mean fluoride levels and dementia in women (1.34, 95% CI 1.28–1.41, P < 0.001) and men (1.30, 95% CI 1.22–1.39, P < 0.001), with dementia risk more than doubled in the highest quartile compared with the lowest. There was no statistical interaction between aluminium and fluoride levels in relation with dementia.
Conclusions
Higher levels of aluminium and fluoride were related to dementia risk in a population of men and women who consumed relatively low drinking-water levels of both.
Declaration of interest
None.
Background
Environmental risk factors for dementia are poorly understood. Aluminium and fluorine in drinking water have been linked with dementia but uncertainties remain about this relationship.
Aims
In the largest longitudinal study in this context, we set out to explore the individual effect of aluminium and fluoride in drinking water on dementia risk and, as fluorine can increase absorption of aluminium, we also examine any synergistic influence on dementia.
Method
We used Cox models to investigate the association between mean aluminium and fluoride levels in drinking water at their residential location (collected 2005–2012 by the Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland) with dementia in members of the Scottish Mental Survey 1932 cohort who were alive in 2005.
Results
A total of 1972 out of 6990 individuals developed dementia by the linkage date in 2012. Dementia risk was raised with increasing mean aluminium levels in women (hazard ratio per s.d. increase 1.09, 95% CI 1.03–1.15, P < 0.001) and men (1.12, 95% CI 1.03–1.21, P = 0.004). A dose-response pattern of association was observed between mean fluoride levels and dementia in women (1.34, 95% CI 1.28–1.41, P < 0.001) and men (1.30, 95% CI 1.22–1.39, P < 0.001), with dementia risk more than doubled in the highest quartile compared with the lowest. There was no statistical interaction between aluminium and fluoride levels in relation with dementia.
Conclusions
Higher levels of aluminium and fluoride were related to dementia risk in a population of men and women who consumed relatively low drinking-water levels of both.
Declaration of interest
None.
posted by Bill at
10:22 AM
2 Comments:
I have read this new paper VERY carefully, and can assure you that it is extremely important. The authors work in the field of Alzheimer's Disease research and clearly accept that fluoride in water has beneficial effects on the prevention of dental decay. Despite this, they report there is an increased risk of dementia in the elderly when they have lived in areas in which the concentration of natural fluoride in their drinking water increased even marginally above the very low level recommended for fluoridation.
The increased risk is detectable at fluoride levels that are only around 6% of the so-called 'optimal' level for fluoridation. At only 10% of that recommended level, the risk of developing dementia is more than doubled. They also found an increase in this risk when the water contained less than one fifth of the maximum permissible level of aluminium.
A word of caution – this research does NOT prove that fluoride causes dementia, and the authors are careful not to make any such claim. However, the evidence of a demonstrably increased risk of contracting the unpreventable, untreatable and terminal condition of dementia that currently affects one third of the elderly, has to be seen in context.
Water fluoridation is justified on the basis of a claimed (but still controversial) benefit in preventing tooth decay in infants. This decay is that is preventable, treatable, and survivable. But it is available only through exposure to fluoride at a concentration that is many times greater than that which is associated with a greatly increased risk of dementia.
This new research finding must immediately invoke the 'Precautionary Principle', and impose a moratorium on the continuation of existing water fluoridation schemes, and on attempts to start new ones.
Dementia is predicted to more than double in the next two decades, and is becoming the greatest drain on human resources within the public health sector. If the reported 'risk' turns out to indicate a causal relationship, then ignoring its implications now will condemn very large numbers of elderly people to a devastating end-of-life condition.
And if water fluoridation does actually have any benefits whatsoever, any consequential loss of such benefits could easily be replaced by improving children's dental education through initiatives such as the 'Child Smile' scheme.
Taking avoidable risks with the health and welfare of the elderly in order to prop up the crumbling 'House of Cards' that is water fluoridation is totally unacceptable.
Recent high-level legal decisions that reinforce the ruling by Lord Jauncey that fluoride is a medicinal product, deliberately ignored by the MHRA and Public Health England, imply that the refusal of PHE to employ the Precautionary Principle may incur liability for failing to act with 'Due Diligence'. A full precautionary policy to ensure that the risk identified by this new research is recognised and appropriately mitigated is now essential.
By
Doug Cross, at 02 April, 2019
Kids can live without teeth - you can't live without a brain!
Liz Vaughan
Past Chair, National Pure Water Association
Founder UK Councils Against Fluoridation, supported by 28 of the 31 Councils in Northern England, representing over 1 million people.
By
Liz Vaughan, at 02 April, 2019
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